Mikey Campling's Blog: Mikey Campling's Blog, page 10

The Season of Swirling Mists and Mellow Fruitfulness, October 2022

Autumn in Devon

The earth turns, the seasons roll around, and so we head into autumn once again.

A good, crisp, clear autumn day, with the leaves turning golden, the air still sweet with the memories of summer, a juicy blackberry plucked from the hedgerow, and the promise of a hot drink when we get home, make for a joyous experience.

There I go, waxing poetical, but there’s something about autumn that brings out those wistful emotions. I think it must be something to do with saying farewell to t...

A Study In Stone – a prequel to the Devonshire Mysteries

A Study in Stone is available from me as a free book when you join my readers’ group, The Awkward Squad.

Alternatively, you can buy it on all the main stores for a nominal price. However, it doesn’t always appear on the series page, especially  on Amazon.  This is because A Study in Stone is now officially Book 0, the prequel to the series. One reader described it as the origin story for Dan and Alan, and I think that’s a reasonable description. This is the beginning of their journey together.

V...

Lower Price for Valley of Lies – a rural murder mystery

October is a great time to sit in the warm with an engaging murder mystery to read, so I’ve reduced the price of the Devonshire Mystery, Valley of Lies.If you like your crime fiction cosy (or cozy), then you’ll enjoy this murder mystery set in the distinctly rural county of Devon.This is a small village mystery, but it isn’t all tea and scones.

Whatever books you pick as winter draws on (in this part of the world at any rate), I hope you have a relaxing time, escaping the dark skies and cold n...

The City of Bath – 28 Sep, 2022

The City of Bath – Ancient and Modern

Mrs C and I took a break to visit the city of Bath, and we enjoyed it immensely. I’d been once before, and I knew there were many historical treasures in the place, but I hadn’t realised the modern city was so vibrant and busy. Living in such a small and quiet village, we find it quite a novelty to have a choice of restaurants and entertainment venues on our doorstep.

I took lots of photos, and I hope you enjoy this selection. As always, you can see the full...

Cooling off down by the lake 14 Sep, 2022

Cooling off during the recent heatwave.

We’ve had some unprecedented temperatures in the UK recently, and that’s not great for dogs, especially black dogs of a certain vintage, so Sue and I took Lottie up to a nearby reservoir to cool off.

We took a picnic rug and just sat in the shade of the leafy bank, looking out at the water. It was a lovely thing to do. I don’t know about you, but I rarely just sit down and do nothing, not for long anyway, and this experience reminded me of the joy of just ...

Mysteries, Thrillers and Suspense – Buy one, get one for free on Kobo

Kobo are having a promotion on mysteries, thrillers and suspense ebooksRunning throughout September, if you buy certain ebooks you can claim another ebook free, provided that book is in the promotion, of course.

The offer is available in Canada, the UK, the USA, Australia and New Zealand.

Here are some handy links:

Australia: https://kobo.com/p/sept-thrills-au

New Zealand: https://kobo.com/p/sept-thrills-nz

Canada: https://kobo.com/p/sept-thrills-ca

UK: https://kobo.com/p/sept-thrills-uk

USA: h...

Palm trees and a profusion of colour in the Eden Project 1 Sep, 2022

A recent trip to the Eden project in Cornwall.

I’ve been to the Eden project several times over the years, and I always enjoy strolling through the biomes: domes contrived to replicate particular habitats. The tropical biome is always a favourite of mine. It can be slightly arduous to trek around the place because it is kept warm and humid, but on this occasion the UK was having a heatwave, so it really wasn’t all that different to the temperature outside.

There’s also a mediterranean biome, com...

A Mysterious Hotel and Smugglers Tunnel – Featured Photos – 22 August, 2022

As I mentioned in a recent podcast, we recently visited Bigbury-on-Sea, a lovely Devon beach with acres of warm sand running down to the sparkling sea (on the day we visited anyway).

For me, one of the beach’s best features is the fact that it faces Burgh Island, a small island that’s only cut off from the shore at high tide. The island and its art deco hotel were used as settings by Agatha Christie in And Then There Were None and Evil Under the Sun, so I could sit on the beach and imagine amate...

Accomplice to Murder – Errors

When Accomplice to Murder launched at the beginning of August, it had been checked by a professional editor and I thought it was as error-free as possible.Sadly, that turned out not to be the case.I was appalled that a number of typos and errors had slipped through, and these mistakes were only caught by the kind and generous readers who’d requested an advanced reader copy (often called an ARC).Some of these mistakes were minor typos but others were more annoying and that’s completely unacce...

A Picnic, a Church, Feathered Friends and a Spiky Visitor – Featured Photos – 14 August, 2022

Recently, Sue and I, along with one of our grown-up sons and his partner, experienced a microcosm of rural Devon life in one day.

We took a picnic to the park in the nearby small town of Bovey Tracey where they were holding a small fete as part of their carnival week. We watched a demonstration of falconry and then ate our picnic in the shade of a tree before touring the craft stalls. These seemed a little too commercial to me, especially compared to the village shows I remember when I was growi...